black box reasoning

The scary thing about black holes is that their gravity inexorably drags in everything within its reach. Unless you are very far away or have sufficient escape velocity, you will get pulled in, and, once you are sucked in, you are never getting out. We call it our "healthcare" system, but usually what we mean is medical care. It treats illnesses, it puts us under the care of medical professionals, it turns us into patients. A doctor's visit begats prescriptions, and perhaps some testing. Testing leads to procedures. Procedures lead to hospital stays. Hospital stays lead to....you get the idea. What we might once have thought of as "health" -- or never thought about at all -- becomes "health care," a.k.a. medical care. And once you transform from a person, whose health belongs to you, to a patient, your health is never quite your own again. You've been sucked into the medical care black hole.

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